11/8/11

This Week's Most Offensive Stories

Mississippi Personhood Vote

If you haven't heard of the personhood vote, be prepared. It was a vote to ban abortion and to state clearly that life begins at conception. It wasn't only to ban abortion though, it was also a vote that would make certain birth control (such as the morning after pill) illegal, in vitro fertilization would be dangerous (if an embryo didn't survive the doctor could be charged with murder), and those raped or in cases where the pregnancy endangered mother's life they would be forced to carry on with the pregnancy.The vote failed yesterday, thank goodness. To me, even if you are pro-life, which is your choice, this legislation was all about imposing your religious beliefs on others. This wasn't even just straight up anti-abortion, it was complicating so many other aspects of a person's choice and life.

Decide for yourself. As a woman I have a different view of this. But just think about all of the under the table abortions that would occur. It would be so much more dangerous to women's health and would really just benefit those with enough money to go somewhere else to have an abortion.

Others knew about the abuse. A graduate assistant, head coach Joe Paterno (who did report it to higher officials - but not police), the athletic director, and the list goes on. Paterno, the beloved Penn State coach, will step down at the end of this season.

The story is sickening. A non-profit where he prayed on little boys? Multiple people knew but nothing was done. Sandusky took boys on road trips with the team, he was seen abusing a boy in the football showers by that graduate assistant. The whole thing is disgusting and inexcusable and Paterno's reputation will never be as grand as it could have been had he just gone to police. If some had just gone to the police this could have been stopped instead of letting it go on for 15 years.

Michigan Bullying Legislation

Michigan's new bullying law has to be the most backwards bullying law in the country. It has the ability to protect the one doing the bullying. For example, if someone is devoutly Christian and happens to feel that homosexuality is a sin they could legally bully that person because it is their religious beliefs. Basically it is their religious right to harass someone because they don't agree.

Funny story though, what if a Muslim bullied a Christian because they don't agree? I think that loophole would be changed real quick.

The saddest thing is that I'm Catholic and I can see that these things just don't make sense when you look at them from a different perspective. This hasn't actually passed yet, we'll see if Michigan can realize what they are doing. Where did that old saying, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all" go?